Personal History – Thomas Francis Mc Manus

This story is from a first-hand account from my father. It happened when he was only five or six. At the time him, his parents, and his grandfather, lived in a small house on Curraghill, Drumshanbo, Leitrim.

It must have been 1970 or 1971, when his father bought their first tractor. It was a little Ferguson 20, the one everyone in the area had at the time. There was excitement in the house – never before had the Mc Manus’ had one, and it was GaGa (my great-grandfather) who was going to put it into use first.

GaGa had never used a tractor before. Don, my grandfather, set him at it – starting it up and showing him how to work the attachment on the back. They had a small meadow, and he was going to turn over and line up all the hay. It would only need about an hour.

Time began to pass and GaGa continued working. He didn’t come in for dinner – he just kept going. From the window in the house, Don and my dad could see that he’d finished – all of the hay had been lined up, yet he just kept going. He went over the rows again and again, redoing and redoing what he’d done. They didn’t go out to him, thinking he was just enjoying “playing” with the new toy.

It had gotten dark, and almost five hours had gone past, when suddenly the noise of the tractor’s engine cut off with a coughing sound. Finally, GaGa joined them in the kitchen.

“I was going great until it ran out of diesel,” was all he said.

His son didn’t question how long he’d been out there.

“It’s alright, I’ll get some more tomorrow and bring it down,”

With that Don left the room.

Once he was gone, GaGa leaned over to my father and whispered;

“Don’t tell your dad, but, I couldn’t get the thing stopped!”

He’d gone around and around all day because he didn’t know how to turn it off.

Thomas Francis (FaFa or GaGa) Mc Manus – 1911-2001

Daniel Peter (Don) Mc Manus – 1939-2006

Kevin Joseph Mc Manus

All of Curraghill, Drumshanbo, Lovely Leitrim.

'

That field of glory. The story of Clontarf, from battleground to garden suburb Read More

Darkest Dublin: The story of the Church Street disaster and a pictorial account of the slums of Dublin in 1913Read More

Personal Histories

Personal Histories is an initiative by History Ireland,
which aims to capture the individual histories of Irish
people both in Ireland and around the world. It is hoped
to build an extensive database reflecting Irish lives,
giving them a chance to be heard, remembered and to
add their voice to the historical record.
Click Here to go to the Personal Histories page

On this Day

1981 Sir Norman Stronge, former speaker of the Stormont parliament, and his son James were shot dead by the Provisional IRA at their home, Tynan Abbey, close to the Armagh/Monaghan border.

1933 George Moore (80), author, notably of Esther Waters (1894), and leading light in the Irish Literary Revival, died.

1924 Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (53), communist revolutionary and premier of the Soviet Union since 1922, died of a stroke.

1922 The Craig–Collins agreement promised an end to the ‘Belfast Boycott’—the ban on northern goods coming into the South—in return for Catholics intimidated out of the Belfast shipyards being allowed to return.

1919 The first Dáil Éireann convened at the Mansion House, Dublin.

Above: Scene from the Battle of Isandlwana, 22 January 1879, the British Army’s heaviest military defeat by the Zulus. (Maynooth University Library)

1879(Jan.21–23)The Battle of Isandlwana/Rorke’s Drift. For many, the six-month Zulu War, prompted by the invasion of King Cetshwayo’s independent kingdom by British colonial forces under Lord Chelmsford, is viewed through the prism of the 1964 movie Zulu, which portrayed, with considerable artistic licence, the epic defence of a mission station—named after Irishman James Rorke, who had a trading store there— by c. 100 British troops (including a dozen or so Irishmen) against c. 3,000 Zulus. Thanks to Chelmsford, this strategically insignificant engagement was widely publicised. The bravery and self-sacrifice of the plucky Brits was applauded—no mention was made, of course, of their execution of c. 500 Zulu prisoners—and no less than eleven VCs were awarded (in contrast with one VC each for the 1944 D-Day landings and the entire Battle of Britain). All of this was designed by Chelmsford to distract British public attention from what had preceded it: the crushing defeat of his army at Isandlwana, with the loss of over 1,300 of his men, including many Irishmen, by the main c. 20,000-strong Zulu army, armed with spears and shields. While British gallantry was duly extolled (such as the heroic last stand of County Leitrim’s Col. Anthony Durnford and the valiant but fatal effort by Dubliner Lt. Nevill Coghill to retrieve his regiment’s colours), her historians are still trying to explain the defeat. Causes include the lack of screwdrivers to loosen the screws on the ammunition boxes. From a Zulu perspective, Isandlwana was a glorious victory—but a pyrrhic one. Cetshwayo knew that the British would regroup and re-invade, which they did. Superior numbers and technology prevailed, and by July, after six more battles, Zululand was entirely subjugated.